covid19

I love eleven-year-old girls. They smell like freshly opened boxes of crayons and cupcakes. The kind with sprinkles on top.
I love it when they’re named mid-twentieth-century names. The names our grandmothers, aunts, and librarians carried.

Helen lives on the route I walk with Ruby each morning. I’ve estimated her age and that of her little sister Abigail, by their smell and zest for life. Abigail smells like baby powder so she’s eight. I can’t explain how I know that——I just do.

Since quarantine began I don’t see them out and about anymore. But the signs of their zesty, lifieness, well, that’s EVERYWHERE. At some point in the past few days, the sisters, apparently armed with chalk, got out. And instead of the usual flowers and twirly-que-grafitti they usually leave, they jotted down a bunch of their most inspirational thoughts.

How did they know it was just what I, what we ALL needed?  

Because eleven-year-olds and their little sisters are wise. Like scary wise. It’s that time just before conformity and perfectionism kicks in, when sheer grace can shine through unobstructed. Lately, due to circumstances beyond my control, my own eleven-year-old self has started to show up more and more.

She’s named Janet, a fifties name if I’ve ever heard one, and she’s zesty, and feisty, and smells like hope.

I love my husband.
He is doing all the hard stuff. We’re all doing the hard stuff, but I’m watching him do the stuff that’s hard and well, that’s hard too—so I stopped. I stopped watching him and starting paying attention to my own hard stuff, which I’m sad to report didn’t make his stuff any easier but I felt better.

Even when his circus of hard visits itself upon me, I do my best to look away.

I have to.
I have my own hard stuff to attend to.
This morning, when I was in our bedroom meditating and he was already out in his office, having coffee and looking at his empty calender, I heard something unusual in our backyard. Naturally, I texted him to go and investigate because I’m just that lazy and husbands are made for that kind of hard stuff. They relish it. It isn’t even hard for them. It’s fun and who doesn’t need a little fun these days?

BTW: It was nothing. But I know it was something. Something was lurking. So there’s that to add to my hard stuff pile. Backyard lurking.

I love my friends. All of them. They are the reason I am who I am. so you can blame them. 

My BFF and I laugh our guts inside out on a daily basis and it SAVES me.
We’re doing big work in the world these days. Work we were born to do. Work I know I’ve trained for my whole life. Yet, some days the “hard” wins and I just want to disappear into a pile of marshmallow cream— or donuts.

This morning I went to the grocery store which used to be such a non-event but has now become a scene out of The Hunger Games. Masked and gloved and ready for some dystopian warfare, I walked the aisles of Trader Joe’s like a tribute. “May the odds be ever in your favor” I wanted to say to the hollow-eyed man lunging for the last ripe avocado.

When I got home, my husband left the hard stuff he was doing at his desk and helped me set up a grocery triage/sanitation station in the kitchen. After that, I took a Silkwood shower and began the rest of my day. But even my eleven-year-old has no zest left in her. And you know what? That’s okay. Because it has to be.

And last but never least, I love this community.

I see you and I FEEL you all sequestered in your homes, your big hearts beating in tandem. Wondering and waiting for the day when the world looks less scary. When we can leave our homes and hug a friend. And never take “normal” for granted again.

Carry on,
xox

“First of all, fuck the future, stay in the NOW!” ~ Me

Elizabeth Gilbert, the author, speaker, and all-around wise-warrior-goddess, posted something on Instagram the other day that reminded me of an exercise I was taught back in the eighties when I was blindsided by debilitating anxiety attacks. Between gasping for air and literally feeling as if the sky was falling, I was advised to practice the 5-4-3-2-1 Coping Technique For Anxiety, and it always made me feel better even if I had to do it five times an hour.

Since basically everyone and their mother on planet earth is feeling a bit anxious these days, I thought I’d share it too.

It goes like this:

Stop whatever you’re doing and look around. Notice five things you can see.

Then take a breath and notice four things you can hear.

Breathe…and notice three things you can feel.

Breathe again and notice two things you can smell.
And then finally take a deep breath and notice one thing you can taste.

If you do this a few times a day you will literally bring yourself back to your senses!

What this does, is bring you back into your body, back into the present moment which, even though it feels uncertain and scary, is unquestionably better than living in that zombie apocalypse movie running on the endless loop inside your head.

And trust me, when you’re in your body you make better decisions.
You look out for yourself and those around you.
You’re somebody other people trust.
You call and check on friends.
And you finally, finally clean out that disgusting hall closet!

I know this sounds trite but I’m gonna say it anyway, because what are you going to do to me that sucks more than a pandemic?

Time is constantly moving forward. Nothing lasts forever. And this too shall pass.

I love you, stay healthy, stay calm and carry on,
xox